Treasures of the Elizabethan Era
by Audrey Lynne
Summary: Elizabeth's mom finds a box in the basement...and the surprises that lie in store for her don't end at its contents. Totally gen.


**_Treasures of the Elizabethan Era_**

_by Audrey Lynne_

Marilyn Weir smiled with fond recollection as she opened the dusty box she'd found in her basement, the one simply marked "Lizzie's Stuff" in a child's scrawl. Elizabeth hadn't let anyone call her Lizzie, or even Liz, since she was eleven, when she'd calmly informed everyone, "I think I'd like to be called Elizabeth." Marilyn had kept this box for years, never opening it. She'd been a girl once herself, after all, and she had stashed private treasures away, things meant to be hers and hers alone. But Elizabeth was nearly forty years old now, and she'd never once mentioned the box, not even on her rare trips home. Did that mean her treasure box was free to be opened? Had she forgotten about it entirely? Marilyn had never forgotten, and she had always wondered what was inside. It gave her something to ponder while her daughter was off saving the world.

Lizzie had always been a determined child. Marilyn had known she'd go on to do great things ... all devoted parents hoped that for their children, but Marilyn, she'd known. Ever since Lizzie had come running to her in tears, barely five years old, after catching a glimpse of the evening news. Marilyn had thought perhaps her young daughter had heard of a murder or something horrible like that, but she'd quickly learned that the segment Lizzie had watched was about the latest goings-on in the USSR. Lizzie hadn't been worried for her own safety, but instead, it distressed her that some grownups decided that entire countries just couldn't get along. If she had to play nice with the bratty children down the street, then why didn't Russia and America have to do the same? Marilyn had wondered the same thing herself many a time, but she had never seen it from the unique perspective of a child before. And, really, when reduced to that level, international conflicts did seem pretty silly.

Marilyn had smiled and supported Elizabeth when she'd chosen to major in political science, though she'd heard from many a friend that a political science degree was just broad enough to leave the holder of it qualified for absolutely nothing. Perhaps that was true in many cases, but Elizabeth had set out to defy expectations and she'd succeeded wildly. She'd earned her doctorate and become an international negotiator, highly in demand. Little Lizzie had grown up, and become the adult who _was_ going to make those bickering countries get along.

With a wistful sigh, Marilyn eased back the aged tape holding the brightly-colored box's lid in place and lifted the lid aside. Elizabeth could forgive her later. There were a couple of school papers, both geography, and somehow Marilyn wasn't surprised. One was a map of the world, with the continents shaded in different colors. It wasn't a perfect paper, surprisingly enough, and the teacher's comment in red made Marilyn laugh. _Where is Antarctica?_ Elizabeth had spent several months supervising an international coalition of some sort at McMurdo Base, yet in third grade, the continent apparently hadn't been worthy of her attention.

Underneath the geography papers were several pictures, childhood friends. Marilyn wondered if Elizabeth knew what had become of any of them. As she'd become a teenager, and later, an adult, Elizabeth had become something of a loner. She didn't find people beneath her, not at all, but they couldn't understand her drive, the way she viewed the world, and Elizabeth had often found it easiest not to deal with them at all.

Simon had broken through that, for a time, but she'd even closed him out. He couldn't understand her occasional need for space, even after she'd been away for months hammering out treaties in Europe. Marilyn had noticed the stress fractures in their relationship, even before Elizabeth had packed everything and left for Antarctica--and then a mysterious international mission she could reveal even less about. While Marilyn hated that Simon had hurt her daughter when he'd found someone else, not knowing if Elizabeth would ever return, Marilyn had no doubt it had ultimately been for the best. Elizabeth didn't let too many people get close to her, but if someone managed to break through her defenses, they would be rewarded with her loyalty. She'd even tried to get him to join her team, later. Perhaps it was her last-ditch effort to save their relationship, but whatever the reasons, she would have held up her end of the bargain they'd made when she accepted his marriage proposal.

Marilyn often wondered what it was Elizabeth actually did wherever she was. She didn't know much about Elizabeth's assignment, only that she was the head of an international expedition that had been organized by the US government. She, along with her entire team, had disappeared for nearly a year, only to later come back and establish semi-regular contact. Rarely, Elizabeth made it back to the States and she'd drop in and see her mother--and Sedgewick, of course. Marilyn had taken Elizabeth's beloved dog in after the breakup with Simon; while he'd been good to Sedgewick, Marilyn hadn't thought he would have wanted to keep his ex-fiancée's dog forever. Rather, his new wife wouldn't have wanted him to keep his ex-fiancée's dog forever.

The very first message Marilyn had received from Elizabeth had terrified her. Wherever Elizabeth was, it was obviously civilized, because the message had been on video, and Elizabeth had recorded it while sitting in some sort of high-tech office. But Elizabeth had said she and the people under her command were facing grave danger, and while Elizabeth's tone had been optimistic, that they would prevail, there had been doubt in her eyes. It was obvious the video message had been a chance for her to say goodbye. Marilyn had worried each time the phone rang after that ... until the time it was Elizabeth, saying she was back in the US for a few days, and she'd be by if she could. While she still couldn't tell Marilyn what she did, Elizabeth did talk about her people, and it was obvious they had become a surrogate family to her. Some mothers might have been jealous, but Marilyn was grateful; Elizabeth had finally learned to let people in.

Over the next year and a half, letters arrived sporadically, the occasional video message as well. Marilyn was able to write back care of a NORAD address in Colorado, and while it apparently took a long time for the letters to arrive, Elizabeth always thanked her for them. The tone of Elizabeth's letters changed; sometimes, it was obvious she was feeling the stress of leadership, but other times, she was perfectly content. Her latest communication had arrived a week ago, a video this time, and it was a lighthearted description of her typical day. Marilyn had watched the video enough times to have it memorized, as she did all of them.

_"Hi, Mom. I've got a couple minutes and Rodney's handy-cam, so I thought I'd send a video. I got your letter ... and I know you know I can't tell you everything I do, but you asked. Hopefully, the Air Force won't cut too much of this out." She laughed, brushing a lock of hair behind one ear. "I feel like everyone's mother around here some days, stepping in and mediating disputes. I know that's part of why they hired me, but I expected it to be more along the lines of fostering international cooperation and less of a playground monitor thing."_

Elizabeth had continued on for another minute or two about the silly fights that came up, but it was obvious she didn't really mind having to step in to fix things. She spoke of John and Rodney, and two local allies named Teyla and Ronon, like always. They seemed to be her closest friends, along with a doctor named Carson and an engineer, Radek. Elizabeth had confessed she was sure Radek might have had a crush on her, a suspicion Rodney had apparently confirmed, but what Elizabeth had declined to mention was if she returned the feelings at all. Marilyn didn't know the man, but he sounded very sweet from Elizabeth's descriptions, and it might have been good for Elizabeth to start dating again. Marilyn understood Elizabeth's reservations about seeing anyone from her command, but considering she was apparently in a pretty remote location, it was doubtful there were too many singles venues nearby.

Marilyn hoped to meet Elizabeth's friends someday, not only to put faces to the names, but to get to know the people who had become such an integral part of her daughter's life. The way she talked about them, it was clear they were the earth and heaven to her, even when getting on her last nerve, and Marilyn honestly couldn't remember anyone else Elizabeth had spoken of that way.

Since her husband's death, Marilyn hadn't traveled much; she lived vicariously through Elizabeth's work. Whenever it was possible, Elizabeth had always sent back trinkets from the different lands she visited. Marilyn looked down at the box in her hands and decided it would be an excellent place to store some of the smaller knickknacks, along with the papers it already housed. But there was one more paper Marilyn hadn't looked at yet, lost in memory as she was. Gently, she pulled a folded piece of paper out from under the small pile. Artwork. Some of the drawings along the outer edge, Marilyn couldn't identify, but in the middle, the crayon sketch definitely resembled a bird. Marilyn had no idea what the significance of it had been to Lizzie at the time, why she'd kept it, but there it was. And it seemed even _more_ significant somehow, so many years after the fact. Like the bird, scribbled on construction paper, Elizabeth had stretched her metaphorical wings and flown away. Marilyn's little girl had left the nest and flourished, and while she couldn't have been prouder, Marilyn missed her.

A knock on the door startled Marilyn from her daydreams, and she rose to answer it, Sedgewick happily trailing her the whole way. Marilyn had almost forgotten the dog was there, she'd been so quiet. Sedgewick loved people, though, and she never missed an opportunity to help Marilyn welcome visitors. A quick glance through the peephole revealed a man standing casually on the porch, and while Marilyn didn't know him, she wasn't getting any worrisome vibes. She opened the door, letting Sedgewick edge her way in, and smiled at the man. He was in his late thirties or early forties, probably, and charmingly attractive ... if only he'd comb his hair. He looked like he'd just rolled out of bed, but Marilyn supposed that was the style these days. "Hello. Can I help you?"

Her visitor took off his sunglasses. "Mrs. Weir?"

"Yes?" Marilyn was beginning to wonder what this was about.

The man extended a hand, which Marilyn tentatively shook. "My name's John Sheppard. I work with your daughter."

God, this was Elizabeth's friend John. At first, Marilyn was thrilled to be meeting him, but as her brain caught up, fear took over. Why was he there? The bottom fell out of her world as she realized what the most likely explanation was for an Air Force officer who was supposed to be on remote assignment to be showing up on her doorstep. "Oh, my God ... what's happened to Elizabeth?"

John's eyes widened, and he jumped a little, as if he was as surprised as Marilyn. "Oh ... no, God, she's fine. She's great! This ... it's a surprise for her."

"A surprise?" Marilyn echoed. Her relief that Elizabeth was apparently all right temporarily overwhelmed Marilyn's capability to think straight. "What kind of surprise are we talking about?"

John reached out to pet Sedgewick as the dog edged further toward him. "You, and ..." He frowned, as if trying to remember something. "Sedgewick. Elizabeth talks about you all the time."

Marilyn chuckled. "Sedge more than me, I'm sure." Elizabeth adored that dog.

John's eyes sparkled. "You'd be surprised, ma'am." He offered her a lopsided smile. "See, some of us on her team, we don't have a lot of family ... we _are_ each other's family. And so I guess you could say it makes it kind of special when someone _does_ have a family they're close to. I'm not at liberty to discuss a lot of details, but we've had a kind of rough time of it lately, a lot going on, and Elizabeth, Rodney, and I had some business call us back to Colorado for a couple days."

"Seems like it's an awfully long trip for only a couple of days," Marilyn commented.

Now John was the one chuckling. "You have no idea, ma'am. It's a lot of administrative cra--er, junk, really, but the thing is, Elizabeth's under a lot of pressure, and I think seeing you and Sedgewick, even for a little while, would do her a world of good."

Marilyn was touched that Elizabeth's friends would think to do such a thing for her, and she was glad to see the loyalty Elizabeth had for them was not misplaced. "That's very sweet of you, especially since you've come all this way."

"There's, ah ... something else." John glanced around. "I don't mean to be forward, but can I come inside?"

Marilyn stepped back from the doorway. "Of course."

Once they were both inside, John withdrew an envelope from the leather jacket he was wearing and put it on the coffee table. "I had to pull a couple strings to get you this, but there's a general at the Pentagon who owes me a few gazillion favors, or so he claims."

"What is this?" Marilyn asked, reached for the envelope as it was nudged toward her.

"A non-disclosure agreement," John told her. "Don't worry; if you sign it, ninjas aren't going to come for you in the night."

Marilyn laughed. Damn, but the man could be charming, even if her maternal instincts were still pushing her to grab a comb and tame that cowlick of his. "It's only if I break it that the ninjas come, right?"

His face lit up with a grin. "You got it. Basically, this general owes me some favors and the President owes _him_ some favors, so we were able to get your security clearance upped enough to tell you a few things. Now, you still won't know everything, but it's a hell of a lot more than what we've been able to tell you so far. And you'll know where Elizabeth's been, even if you decide not to believe it."

That was all the encouragement Marilyn needed to sign the agreement. She took John's pen immediately, and after reading the document quickly, signed her name on the appropriate line. "Now, Colonel Sheppard ... where _has_ Elizabeth been?"

"Call me John."

"All right, John." Marilyn smiled at him. "Where has my daughter been?"

John stood up, fishing two other things from his pocket. He carefully put one on Sedgewick's collar and handed the other to Marilyn. "Here, hold that. I'll tell you everything once we get to Colorado."

"Colorado?" Marilyn demanded. "We're in Georgetown, John! Even if we got on the Metro right now and caught a flight--which will be hard, since I refuse to let Sedgewick ride as cargo--it'll be hours! You can't expect to waltz in here, tease me with that information, have me sign your agreement, and then make me wait until we get to Colorado!"

An impish look crept onto John's face. "Now I see where Elizabeth got her spirit. But don't worry. Sedgewick won't ride cargo--and neither will we. Where we're going, we don't need flights." He tapped the device on his own collar. "Daedalus? This is Sheppard."

A second later, the room flashed white completely. It cleared for a second, and Marilyn recovered enough from her shock to see what she thought looked like a ship of some kind, but then the light flared again. When it cleared this time, she gasped in shock. Not only were they outside, but she could've sworn they were standing outside Cheyenne Mountain. Sedgewick appeared amazingly unbothered by this turn of events, but then, it took a _lot_ to bother her.

John gestured at the mountain. "Mrs. Weir, welcome to Colorado."

Marilyn's mind was still racing to catch up. "How is this possible?" She had known Elizabeth's scientists were working on some pretty out-there things, or she'd suspected it, but Washington, DC to Colorado in less than ten seconds?

John began to walk her toward the entrance, glancing to make sure Sedgewick was trotting along beside them. "We have friends in high places. I'll get to that. But I promised to tell you where Elizabeth's been first, and I promised to bring you to see her. And I like to keep my promises. She's inside, and I think she's still in a meeting, but that'll give you and I time to talk."

Marilyn was still in shock, but she was sure that was only going to get worse as she heard more. "So talk."

John nodded in an "as you wish" sort of fashion. "A long time ago, a bunch of Egyptian archeologists found this huge ring in the deserts of Egypt ... it's called a Stargate. I don't know exactly how it works, still--you can ask Rodney later--but it opens these things called wormholes to other planets."

Marilyn would have laughed if she wasn't so sure he was serious. "Elizabeth's been on another planet?"

"Yes," John said. "In another galaxy, one called Pegasus."

Now Marilyn did laugh. This was sounding like a bad science fiction plot, and she would have left entirely if it weren't for the matter of John's chosen method of transportation. That was so out there, she almost _could_ buy that it had been alien technology, found out in another galaxy somewhere. But she couldn't resist a dig at the absurdity of it all. "I suppose next you're going to tell me you found the lost city of Atlantis, too?"

John did a double take--or half of one, before he caught himself. "Well, actually..."

_The End_


End file.
